


but your grin's a comfort

by coricomile



Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: Alternate Universe - Asylum, M/M, Mental Instability, Mental Institutions, Unreliable Narrator
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-26
Updated: 2013-07-26
Packaged: 2017-12-21 11:22:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,386
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/899705
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coricomile/pseuds/coricomile
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I’ve seen nothing,” Cecil says dutifully. He has seen nothing and heard nothing. Just like a good citizen of Night Vale should. “It’s very interesting.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	but your grin's a comfort

He likes to stay in the studio. Outside has gotten messier day by day, full of screams and glowing clouds and bleeding walls. The angels say the world is ending, reports Old Woman Josie. They would know, wouldn’t they?

So Cecil choses to stay indoors. It’s safer there, with his little jumble of papers and his solid, shining microphone. He reads the traffic reports and gives the daily memo from the City Council and hums along to the weather. His life is simple because it is dictated to be.

“You look positively starving,” Intern Jessica says. She’s a pretty young thing, barely old enough to have an intern license or even a blue-eyes-on-Sundays license. Perhaps management has changed its policies again. He would hardly be surprised.

“I’ve had six spider legs and a jam sandwich,” Cecil tells her gently. He rubs his stomach with a wide-spread hand and hums. Spider legs. So crunchy, so delectable. Perhaps he could lobby to get them into the vending machine in the hall. It would certainly save him time on catching the poor creatures. Intern Jessica shivers. 

“Maybe we could get you a proper dinner, yeah?” She flits in the doorway, looking back over her shoulder into the hall. He can hear station management clicking and hissing in their office. Something smells of fire. “Some nice pasta maybe?”

“You seem like a nice girl,” Cecil says, shaking his head. Poor thing, involved in the trade of wheat and wheat-by-products at such a young age. “I can ignore the mandatory tattle protocol if you promise not to mention your shady dealings to me again. Well, your wheat-based shady dealings. I’m always good for any tales of shady rat-trade.”

“Okay, Cecil,” she says. She doesn’t look him in the eye. Maybe she can’t stand to see the way his third eye quivers under his headwrap. She is new, after all, and it has itched for _days_. “Okay.”

Once he is alone again, Cecil leans into his chair and begins speaking his mandatory daily list of things that begin with the letter Q. Oh, how he wishes he had a dictionary during his daily lists. Too bad they were strictly forbidden.

\---

“Look to the obelisk. We don’t know where it came from, but it’s attracting a lot of cats. Welcome to Night Vale.” Cecil leans into his desk, elbows planted on the grooved wood. He can hear the cats outside, wailing pathetically at one another. The sound is deafening. 

The single window of the studio is open, letting in the moonlight. It is cool and damp, just like any good moonbeam should be, resting over Cecil’s face. He smiles into it, his cheeks tired from a long day of preparing for this moment. How he loves his studio, even if it is so very exhausting.

“Ladies and gentlemen, surely you have noticed. There’s a man in a tan jacket.” Cecil taps his notes against his desk testily. “Countless residents have seen him, but no one can seem to remember exactly what he looks like. Just that he has a tan jacket and a deerskin suitcase, and he has been spotted all over town. But no one can quite recall specifically where they saw him, or what time of day it was. Just that they saw him.”

Cecil had been one of the many residents to see him. He had been flighty and queer, staring in as Cecil read the latest City Council mandate against the consumption of cheddar cheese curds. His gaze, faceless and cold, had sent shivers down Cecil’s spine. 

As he reads, Cecil tries to shove the coldness creeping into his insides away. How the man in the tan jacket had gotten into the station at all was a mystery that Cecil refuses to think about. Usually, station management is so very possessive of even the lot outside. Evil, he thinks grimly. Certainly, he could only be evil.

With a click of the soundboard, Cecil plays the weather. Today sounds like it will be a funky one indeed.

As he’s reorganizing the incoming reports from Night Vale High School, the invisible phone on his desk buzzes. He reaches for it absently and realizes that he is crying. It is not common for him to cry, he thinks. Not without added help from a terribly sad commercial about orphaned kittens or a pill. Odd.

“Hello?” He asks through his tears. He hiccups into the receiver. It is very unbecoming.

“I am an angel,” the voice on the other side says. He thinks this is what it says, anyway. He can barely understand through the clicks and buzzing static that surrounds the thin words. His ears ring. As he looks to the window, his eyes feel like they are going to pop with the sudden influx of dark, terrible light. “The man in the tan jacket is from a place beneath the Earth. He lives underneath our knowledge, in a vast and terrible world right below our feet. Beware. Beware.”

“Is there anything else you could tell us?” Cecil asked, his chest heaving with sobs. The weight over his lungs felt as though it was going to crush him. How terrible Old Woman Josie must feel all the time, if this was what merely hearing an angel did to a person.

After a moment, the hissing, buzzing voice of the angel whispers to him, “A flower in the desert.”

Eyes sore and throat closing up on itself, Cecil places the receiver down. His head hurts. Perhaps, after the show, he would sleep. It had been so very long since he had slept.

\---

“Good morning,” Carlos says from the doorway. When he smiles, his teeth show. Cecil’s left-side heart flips and flops, a happy little cadence that makes him feel shivery. 

“Carlos,” Cecil greets, all his breath leaving him in a rush to be closer to Carlos’ being. “How good to see you.” 

“Would you like to go for a walk?” Carlos asks, hand already extended. His palm is large and pale and perfect, each line crossing it drawn by an expert. Cecil would like to trace his imperfections until they became part of his own skin, buried too far in to ever be replaced.

“Absolutely,” he answers, scrambling up from his desk. Perhaps he will get to see Carlos perform _science_. How fascinating.

It has been days since Cecil has left the station. His legs ache just enough that he has to stop every few minutes to bend his knees and roll his ankles. He hopes Carlos does not think ill of him for slowing them down. He would never be able to stand that.

“What have you seen lately?” Carlos asks. He has his hand wrapped around his ever-present tape recorder. It must be so very hard to be a scientist with the ban on writing utensils. Perhaps Cecil could write a petition to the City Council and ask for an exception to be made on the grounds of science. _Science_.

“I’ve seen nothing,” Cecil says dutifully. He has seen nothing and heard nothing. Just like a good citizen of Night Vale should. “It’s very interesting.”

“And... have you had any visitors to the station?” Carlos opens the door to the community center and holds it for Cecil to duck through. What a gentleman.

“There was a new intern a few days ago. Nice girl. A bit young.” Cecil bounces on the balls of his feet, his station robes swishing around his calves. It’s a bit chilly out. The weather prediction might have been too funky for reality. He’ll have to double check next time. “Hopefully she lasts longer than the last few. And yesterday there was a call from one of Old Woman Josie’s angels. It was maddening. But beautiful. You should hear them one day.”

“One of the angels called you?” Carlos asks. He taps his thumb against the recorder, head tilted to the side. It makes the lights of the community center flash over his glasses beautifully. On the other side of the room, the Apache tracker shrieks into the air vent. 

“It was magnificent,” Cecil says dreamily. 

“Why would an angel need a phone?”

“I wondered the same thing myself.” Cecil sits at his appointed spot and accepts the tray of mashed sandrodent offered to him. Sandrodent is atrocious, but Carlos seems to love it. Cecil will make himself overcome his distaste, if only to have one more thing to discuss with his beloved, beloved Carlos. 

For long hours, Carlos asks him about the station and the angels and station management, his recorder tick, tick, ticking away. Cecil chokes down the sandrodent and answers him with a smile. How he loves this part of his week. 

“Have you noticed,” Carlos says, as a woman who looks remarkably like Intern Dana had, clears away their trays, “that the weather never changes outside the station?” 

“Don’t be silly,” Cecil says. “I play it every day. You just have to listen closer. It’s very nuanced.”

“Of course,” Carlos says. He pats Cecil’s hand, his skin so warm and smooth, and nods. He looks sad. Poor thing. Must be experiencing his time of sorrow early. Or maybe Cecil is running late. He can never tell with these things. “We should get you back. Can’t be late for show time.”

“Never,” Cecil agrees, even though he cannot bear to be parted from Carlos’ company.

\---

The note comes when Cecil isn’t paying attention. He is cleaning the station walls. There has been a terrible plague of black smoke bleeding through the paint. Reports have been coming in from all over town, but so far no one from City Council has given a statement about its origin. Cecil hopes one comes soon. He’s very sick of cleaning.

He is on his third pass over the back wall when he sees the little red envelope. His right-side heart sinks. Oh. Oh, no. He doesn’t want to. Please, don’t make him. He doesn’t even know what he’s done wrong. Perhaps he thought of the dog park in his dreams- stop, Cecil, stop thinking of that place that does not exist. 

The secret police come for him before he is to go on air, their white uniforms shining like the sun against his eyes. He doesn’t want to go with them, but they have their government issued tasers and belts that tie up around his arms and legs before he can run away properly.

They are always listening, he tells himself. They would find him even if he ran forever. There is no escape.

“Calm down, Cecil,” one of them say. He does not know which one it is, for all their faces are blurred by dark masks. “Calm down.”

“Please,” Cecil begs, hearts pounding so very hard in his chest, “I promise I won’t think about it again. I _won’t_. I don’t need the re-education. I’ve learned my lesson.”

“It’ll be easier if you don’t fight,” one of the men say, hauling him off his feet.

Cecil jerks and twists and turns the entire way to the re-education room, shouting into the cloth they stuff into his mouth. Oh, but he _hates_ the re-education process with a fiery passion. 

The re-education room is full of bright lights and blinking machines. It screams static into the air, a sharp hum of electric like lightning cracking across the room. Cecil shouts and shouts, but the secret police do not hear because that is what they are trained to do.

One by one, his arms and legs and body are tied to the table in the center of the room. The padding is soft, but he can already feel the bruises shaping themselves under his skin where he is hitting the steel beneath it. He will hurt for days, for he was not one of the lucky ones born without the ability to feel pain.

The walls bleed around him, thick and viscous and sympathetic. One of the policemen remove the headband around his third eye, peeling it back slowly. It hurts, sticking to his skin. His eye is so sensitive, and the light is so bright.

“Relax,” one of them say again, even as they place the re-educating sensors across his face. They stick and itch and leave welts where they suck at his skin. Cecil wishes it were a Thursday. Crying on Thursdays is perfectly acceptable. 

Even though he knows what is coming, the first wave of pain makes him scream. Oh, but it hurts. Oh, but it makes him shudder uncontrollably under the restraints. The smell of burnt flesh rises up from the bloody walls. His third eye blinks and blinks and blinks.

\---

Carlos brings him tea. It isn’t very good tea, but Cecil makes his shaking hands take up the cup and drinks it anyway. The man in the tan jacket has been sulking around the studio again, watching him. Waiting. Cecil hates him.

“How are you feeling?” Carlos asks gently. He touches the headband around Cecil’s forehead gently. Beneath it, Cecil’s eye trembles. 

“Very tired,” Cecil says. He wants a nap, but the screaming in his head refuses to stop for even a bare moment. It is very rude. “But enough about me. How are you?”

“Fine, Cecil,” Carlos answers. “Absolutely fine.” 

With the care only a scientist could show, Carlos takes his hand and leads him to his desk. They sit at it together, Cecil in his chair and Carlos on the edge of the desk, and Cecil revels in the feel of skin against his. His head aches so very much.

“Cecil,” Carlos says, his free hand sliding across Cecil’s face, “have you thought of leaving Night Vale?” Cecil blinks at him. 

“Absolutely not,” he replies. The welts on his head throb in time to his hearts. They always seem to take so long to go away. “Escape is strictly forbidden.” He squeezes Carlos’ hand gently. “Don’t let them hear you speak of it. You don’t want to go to the re-education room like I did.”

“No, I don’t.” Carlos removes the headband, gingerly peeling it away from the burnt bits of Cecil’s temples. He runs a thumb over the closed lid of Cecil’s eye, shushing him. “Perhaps if I wrote to the City Council, they would give us a vacation. Would you like a vacation?”

“If it was with you? Absolutely.”

“Tell no one,” Carlos says, sliding away. He stares at the closed door of the recording room, his lovely Adams apple bobbing. “Our secret vacation.”

“Of course.”

\---

“The ceremony is over, dear listeners. The children are gone. It seems we have come through this crisis, as all crises before, safe and sound, the alarm only a false alarm. The children that had surrounded us were not the threat we imagined.” Cecil curls his fingers around his microphone, leaning into it as he reads the report. With his eyes closed, he can almost hear the fires in the skies inside the studio with him.

His wounds are mostly healed, but his head still screams and his third eye still aches, but Carlos has been to visit him daily. They have whispered to one another about their secret vacation. Carlos laughs like the stars shine, and Cecil loves him so much it is, in fact, illegal. 

No matter. Cecil would go to the re-education room every day, if only for the way his hearts feel when Carlos looks upon him.

“Listeners, listeners out there, listeners out in the vacant night clinging to my voice as a simulacrum of companionship, remember: fear is just consciousness, plus life.” He thinks of Carlos’ perfect smile, and the way his hair smells like the desert rain. “Regret is an attempt to avoid what has already happened. Toast is bread, held under direct heat until crisp. The present tense of regret is indecision. The future tense of fear is either comedy or tragedy. And the past tense of toast is toasted. Stay tuned now for more voices, more reassuring noise in this quiet world. Good night, Night Vale. Good night.”

As he removes his headset, Cecil looks to his window and smiles into the moonlight. Night Vale, his beautiful home, has given him the strength of one more night. How lovely.

\---

Carlos appears in the middle of the night. His usually present lab coat is missing, but he is still just as dashing without it. As if there could ever be a question about it. Cecil greets him warmly, arms open.

“I have gained permission for leave for two,” Carlos says, so quiet, into Cecil’s ear. He towers over Cecil, so much of him to be absolutely in love with. “But you need to change. Where we’re going, station robes would be inappropriate.”

Cecil takes the clothes Carlos hands to him without question and shuffles to the corner of the studio. For a moment, he stares at them, confused. It has been so very long since he’s worn anything other than his studio robes. He wonders if Carlos would help him if he asked. 

Carefully, he changes. It takes him several long minutes, his fingers fumbling with buttons and zips. He hopes he can get another set of robes when they get to their mystery destination. These clothes _itch_.

“You look nice,” Carlos says. Cecil perks up, even though it makes his feet bend strangely in these _shoes_.

“Thank you.” He takes Carlos’ offered hand shyly. Oh, he is getting used to this.

“Now,” Carlos says, tugging him so very close, “you must be absolutely silent as we leave. Can you do that? For me?”

“Anything for you,” Cecil agrees, and mimes locking his mouth shut. It’s so strange to be told _not_ to talk. He kind of likes the novelty of it. 

Carlos leads him through the town silently, opening doors with the funny little card strapped to his belt. It shines in the lights of the sky, plastic and bright in the darkness. Around them, the nightly wails of the other residents raise up. Cecil longs to join them. 

They slip away without a fuss. Cecil can hear his hearts beating, but the screaming in his head seems to have disappeared. He misses it a little. How do people cope with silence? 

As they reach the edge of Night Vale, Carlos tightens his grip on Cecil’s hand. He lifts one finger in front of his perfectly shaped lips. Oh, to be that finger. Cecil nods. He will be as silent as the corpses buried under the Ralph’s. 

Ringing slices through the night air as they step onto the street of the desert. A parting gift for them perhaps? Cecil looks behind him at the city, already longing for its comforting smog. He tumbles as Carlos breaks into a run. 

“Come on,” he says, his caramel voice sticking to Cecil’s skin. And Cecil runs with him, breaking his vow of silence with a delighted laugh. 

They run and run and run, and Cecil laughs because the wind feel cold on his face and Carlos is saying his name like it is the only word he knows. Behind them, the ringing echoes into the sky. 

\---

“Good morning,” Carlos says. He smiles like he does every day, his teeth so white and his skin so dark. Cecil touches the smooth plane of his chest and the warm curl of his mouth and feels his fingertips prickle with love.

“Good morning,” he repeats. Beneath them, the bed is soft and sleep warm. Their vacation has lasted for a long time. Cecil misses Night Vale, but he would pick this bed and Carlos heavy over him any day of the week. When Carlos kisses him, Cecil’s eye shudders happily. 

“How are you feeling today?” Carlos asks, lips to Cecil’s shoulder. 

“Taupe,” Cecil answers. Taupe is a nice feeling, if a little bland to look at. He misses reporting the news. Perhaps, if they stay longer in this new town, he can get a job at the radio station here. He’d like that.

“Would you like to hear the weather?” Carlos asks, his breath against the curve of Cecil’s neck. Cecil hasn’t had to wear those damned _clothes_ since they checked into the very nice hotel. It’s stunning. 

“Please,” he says. And Carlos turns the radio on, and the forecast sounds beautiful.

**Author's Note:**

> Uh, so there's a vast world in Night Vale the asylum that Cecil refused to talk about in-universe. Also, Carlos is a terrible person for removing Cecil from it, but that is neither here nor there.


End file.
